


Bystander

by moroder



Series: Lost Hopes and Dreams [3]
Category: Undertale (Video Game)
Genre: Gen, all these fics about Frisk are almost a copy of my first playthrough
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-05-08
Updated: 2018-05-08
Packaged: 2019-05-04 05:08:42
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,480
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14585634
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/moroder/pseuds/moroder
Summary: A child desperately trying to reach a happy end and a mysterious grey door in Waterfall.What could possibly go wrong?..





	Bystander

The first restart takes place right after the kid's first defeat.

It seemed a good idea that leaving particular monsters alive would affect the king's behavior towards the human child. Frisk didn't give up hope for a peaceful resolution, for the fight to be optional - they did not only doubt their FIGHTing power but also hesitated to kill Asgore at all.  
They knew exactly what awaited them in Snowdin: bridges, silly jokes, besides he turned around earlier and startled Sans with it; same puzzles to come through that the human solved quickly to the tall skeleton's delight, remembering the solutions; spaghetti stuck to the table; a cozy little town with a noisy hotel and hospitable monsters. Finally, Papyrus. Withstanding endless bone attacks wasn't easy, though Frisk was spared this time - and same for the slim macaroni admirer. The human kid somehow enjoyed seeing him so happy; perhaps Sans was right back then as he stated that Frisk's responsibility is to do the right thing.  
They dragged their feet towards the familiar super expensive telescope. Turned out it's not that exciting to replay the earlier events of your life. Passing by dim dark-blue walls and pitch black corridor with mushrooms being the only light source, little human was slowly falling asleep; at one point their will to proceed decreased to the poimt of stopping and awkwardly hitting the wall by the back of their head.  
It didn't sound like a stone wall. Sure, Frisk didn't hit the walls deliberately to make out a stone sound, but it was too obvious: the sound their head made was rather wooden. They turned around, their sleep momentarily disappearing. In front of them, a large grayish door stood out in an ordinary blue wall, striking an eye with its unusual color. Worst of all, the kid didn't see the door before. Could it have something to do with the countless restarts they did?  
A glimmer of curiosity went ablaze inside them. The human promised himself that it's only a matter of few seconds, and then they'll exit at once. What if freedom was just around the corner, metaphorically?  
Frisk turned the doorknob, and the door swung open, unleashing rectangular darkness, welcoming him inside.  
  
Experience of being wrapped by darkness wasn't appealing anymore. It felt like some kind of slime enveloping the space around them, and Frisk was about to leave, but something held them still - fear or genuine curiosity, they had no idea. They couldn't see the boundaries of this place: it could be the smallest chamber or something around size of a throne room. Their eyes slowly adjusted to surroundings, and soon Frisk realized that the darkness was different: some was pitch black and some was grayed, resembling a simple shadow and slowly disassociating. The black part moved to the center, forming something unstable and jelly-like; then white stains went out in its matter. The human's vision was still a bit blurry, but they silently compared the largest stain to a face and two smaller ones to hands with holes in them. Its face could only distantly resemble a human one. Maybe they just unintentionally disturbed a monster whom they hadn't noticed last time.  
A loud screeching noise pierced the air and Frisk's ears, making them cover them. Its source was most probably the black and white entity; the kid cautiously made a step towards it, causing another soundwave - only this time they could make several words out of.  
"'Small', 'human'?" they asked. "You must be talking about... yes, that's me. But I have a name, it's-"  
" _Frisk_ ", it banged above them, and they shivered.  
"How... do you know that? I never told anyone", they mumbled.  
" _I know everything._ "  
By that time, the grey darkness dissolved enough for human to observe the creature. A tall, approximately king's height, silhouette that kept melting and dripping black liquid on its shadow. Two empty eyesockets and a mouthline cut out on the stain Frisk thought to be a face; dark lines went up and down from its eyes - could be cracks or just the way its liquid moved. _Something_ in this black monster reminded them of two skeleton brothers - perhaps, whiteness of its face?..  
"How do you know everything, then?" the child asked naively. The monster's face went askew, shattering and changing shape entirely; Frisk shifted to the door, getting ready to run.  
"I've only just... asked", they mumbled, trying to find the doorknob and facing the dark creature that was already falling apart into its primary matter - the darkness. No white stains remained at all. Before it would become pitch black again, the human finally turned to the door, pulled its knob and started out.  
  
Third time through Waterfall - and Frisk was broken plus even more tired. They did everything correct - at least they thought so until now. No one killed. No one left alone, they even sang with Shyren (not this time though, they weren't in the mood). Nothing helped - the king still didn't leave them any choice but fight. Then they restarted. Now they were going to answer the phone calls they received from time to time; perhaps it was in fact something important.  
Third time through Waterfall - second encounter of the mysterious grey door. The kid wasn't exactly sure if they needed to enter, but once again their curiosity won - they wanted to know more. Fully determined to find out, they yanked the door open, and the darkness consumed them at the first seconds of stepping inside.  
Their eyes couldn't adjust for a while again, but now they knew what to wait for - they watched. This time it looked like the creature appeared faster, but maybe Frisk was just less frightened.  
"Ahem. I... I don't even know what to call you. Ghostly dude? No... no, better make it only 'ghost'. Though you don't look like that ghost from Ruins at all. How's that, ghostie?"  
The figure didn't respond, but its mouthline moved, forming a kind of smile. For the kid it was equal to agreement, and they continued.  
"Okay then. We couldn't talk last time for some reason, so... Shall you tell me how you found out my name?"  
" _That... is a very long story_ , _Frisk_ ", the 'ghost' spoke, lessening its height; it looked similar to kneeling before the little human. In return, they posed in a very determined way.  
"I have a lot of time. Tell me."  
_"No, young creature. I meant exactly that I won't talk about it."_ The smile from its face washed away, and its mouth turned into a thin line. This topic was closed.  
"Oh... I see. Then what shall we talk about?"  
The figure shrugged with the amorphous mass that represented its shoulders.  
_"Tea?.."_ it suggested cowardly, but the human caught this idea and amplified it in one moment.  
"King Asgore!" his short yelp resounded in the small room. "He talked about tea. Before trying to kill me, sure thing..."  
_"How gruesome it must be",_ the monster responded in its buzzing tone. " _First you're offered a cup of tea, and then your SOUL is torn out. Scary?"_  
"Scary", Frisk admitted, noticing just now that their fists were clenched. "I don't want to fight him. I mean- it's clear that a clumsy human against the king of all monsters doesn't sound... cheerful, but - maybe there is a way to escape this?"  
_"Perhaps there is, but..."_ the ghost went silent. _"Why are you asking me?"  
_ "Because I haven't seen you at the very first time", the human kid grinned. "That means you're playing a certain role in my story. Important or not, but it's still something."  
In response, the figure stared at him for a while; at some point Frisk noticed a faint white glimmer in the darkness of its empty eyesockets. And then, all of sudden, it laughed. Ghost laughing sounded bristly, similar to noise in electronic music, but somehow very sincere.  
_"I'm afraid you'll have to find the answer on your own_ ", it answered, still chuckling and already dissolving into darkness - once again.  
  
Fourth and fifth times through Waterfall are quick.  
Frisk answered the phone calls. It was Papyrus all along, and he never told anything useful. The kid just raced through the area, horrified by being caught, and did not stop near the water cooler that was placed so carefully at the point where Undyne stopped chasing them. It changed nothing at the end, as even Sans talked about same things - level of violence, love that human gained underground. It saddened Frisk to watch him repeating this and possibly knowing it was not the first time. The expression on his face was somehow calming, as if he knew his speech wouldn't change anything.  
At the fourth time, Frisk decided to fight the king.  
Passing by the endless blue walls at the fifth time, they were in the worst possible mood. They fought. They exploited the king's weakness - inability to completely break down the human SOUL without giving a change to avenge itself. It allowed the kid to unleash their determination fully and fight back even when they seemed to be defeated. They didn't notice how they executed the king's request to kill him. They never wanted this, _never_ , they just tried abiding the game rules, but it turned against them - and they restarted.  
Fourth time, and they didn't see the grey door; fifth time, and they're lucky.  
It felt especially black and uneasy inside this time; black hollow stains around them seemed dark and empty rather than welcoming. Moreover, Frisk's new acquaintance behaved completely different. Sure, it appeared once again, but its jelly-like form seemed especially unstable - it was about to fall apart back into black matter any moment.  
_"So you didn't find the answer"_ , it announced instead of greetings. The kid understood it's going to be a hard time.  
"Ghost, I-"  
_"Don't. You tried choosing between FIGHT and MERCY, and... We both know what you did. I won't give you any lecture on this."_  
"But he asked me! He told me to take his SOUL and leave for good!" the human cried, making a step forward and regretting it at once: dark liquid moved a dangerous distance to his feet.  
_"Things you are asked about are **not** necessarily things you do."_  
The dark borders at Frisk's feet disappeared; soon the ghost drowned in the pitch-black darkness, leaving them alone.  
  
Sixth time - and the door isn't there. The human answered each call, returned to Waterfall as they were suggested, but Undyne didn't give up - and Papyrus apologized awkwardly. The human didn't listen to Alphys who was giving them directions in the CORE but got confused herself; they remembered already where to go and caused reproaches by their disobedience. They posed dramatically at the edge of death and dodged the disco ball beams to satisfy Mettaton's aspiration for high ratings. Again, Alphys revealed a (not so) dreadful secret about killing Asgore to escape... Everything repeated so many times that Frisk was ready to rewind all these events to the moment where the king draws out a trident and the wheels start spinning. They were going smoothly, but in the court corridor, as the human called it, Sans acknowledges that their LV equals two. Then the kid remembers: the one and only monster back at the Ruins, a little Froggit who died of their careless actions. That's LV 2.  
Sixth time - and Frisk undergoes hell. They spare Asgore and find out it amounted to nothing. Their small red SOUL flounces under a shower of _heaven knows what_ while Flowey - or what the hell he has turned into - chortles hysterically, watching them and their desperate attempts to survive. They call for other SOULS who fell down a lot or not so lot time ago, and they reach out. Together, they bring down the gargantuan ghoulish creature, overthrowing its underground god status.  
Frisk isn't happy. That's the exact moment a burning will to find justice ignites their SOUL. Their guts feel how unfair the situation was and that the story was supposed to end differently. And they spare the shameless flower, for which it reveals the simplest solution: save each monster's life if possible. Nevertheless, the human kid doesn't trust the fallen creature, and a straightforward theory, downright opposite to Flowey's suggestion, comes alive in their head.  
  
Seventh time - and the door materializes.  
The kid standing in front of it was somehow different from Frisk who'd arrived here before. Maybe it's the higher level of violence; maybe their deadly smile and an empty shifting gaze. No monster would've recognized them by now - and no one will, being dead. They killed everyone they could by themself, even the hospitable exiled queen. The little human's sweater was covered with grey dust with part of it on their face; they didn't pay attention. Going through familiar corridors in Waterfall area, they saw a door on the left and stopped. The entity that Frisk turned into got interested if it could reach the room inhabitant.  
They pulled the doorknob. It didn't fly open or open at all, giving out only muffled metal clatter of the locked door mechanism. Shrugging, they turned away from the grey piece of wood and ventured further.  
  
Eighth time is the last. Quite symbolic, since Frisk was the eight and last human to fall down mountain Ebott.  
They fixed all he could. They listened to the flower that for some reason calmed down this time. Previous time was a haze, but kid could remember two things for sure: murder of everything living and Sans' left eye furiously burning with cyan color, death following shortly after. One time was enough to shift the gears in Frisk's head to correct program.  
They listened patiently through all jokes by the small skeleton; each time they were invited over, they agreed; they barely held himself from kissing the hell out of Papyrus instead of fighting him. They saved the Monster Kid from falling - a thing they've never did before; finally, they helped Undyne by giving her water; they burned down her house, though it didn't bother her that much. They cheered Alphys on their way to the CORE and agreed to watch those silly cartoons of hers; they posed even more dramatically and spectacularly then usual, gaining enormous ratings and ovations.

Now, after Undyne's phone call, trashy date and following elevator adventures they enter the unknown part of his journey. Wandering around barely lit lab corridors, they remember the odd ghostly friend of theirs, locked back there in Waterfall. This time, although the door was open, Frisk didn't enter the room.  
This time they promised themself to break the circle once and for ever. Then they'll return to the door, find their ghost and announce that it's over and everything is fine. Or not. At least they'll just hug him happily - they never tried doing that.

And this little wish fills them with **determination**.


End file.
